Plans for a space welcoming to LGBT homeless people are
facing more delays after officials discovered that the existing shelter set to
house the project doesn't have the permit to operate as a shelter.

The problems involve the Dolores Street Community
Services-run space at 1050 South Van Ness Avenue. Work to establish the
gay-friendly space began not long after a Board of Supervisors committee
hearing in March 2010 in which LGBTs testified about harassment in San
Francisco's shelters. Late last year, some involved with the project had predicted
that the space would be open by mid-February.

But in an interview this week, Dolores Street Executive
Director Wendy Phillips said that in December 2011, "We were ready to go
with the rehab work on the expansion for the new queer-friendly space, and when
the architect went to pull the permits, they realized our existing space had a
permit for social services, but not for sleeping accommodations."

In addition to the shelter, there's a child-care program run
by a separate agency at the site, Phillips said. The child-care center runs
during the day, and the homeless shelter operates at night. Dolores Street also
offers case management.

The shelter first opened about 11 years ago, said Phillips,
who took over as executive director in March after serving in the position on
an interim basis since May 2011. (She replaced previous Executive Director Eric
Quezada, who died in August 2011.) Currently, around 50 men stay at the
shelter, Phillips said.

She said they need a conditional use permit from the Planning
Department, as well as permits from the Department of Building Inspection to do
the rehabilitation work.

"It could take several months, but we're going to do
whatever we can to expedite that process," Phillips said. She said her
agency needs to get approval from the city's Human Services Agency, which is so
far the source of all the money for the project.

"We have to get approval from them for a broader scope
of work, which means more money," Phillips said. If the additional funding
is approved, the conditional use permit application will be submitted, she said,
but "now that it's a broader project, we may have to work with [the Human
Services Agency] to look for money elsewhere," she said.

"We've just received the cost estimate from our
estimator based on the architect's drawing, which includes bringing the
existing use into compliance, as well as the expansion," she said.

The expected cost for the LGBT-related expansion had been
$178,000, Phillips said. She said that the new figure would be "maybe a
couple hundred thousand dollars" more.

A call to the Human Services Agency wasn't returned.

Problem missed

Phillips said she didn't know how it had been missed that
the shelter didn't have the permit it needed to operate.

"The shelter opened before any of the current staff
were working here, so I think that because we've been getting funds from the
city for so many years to operate it, we just assumed that it had the proper
permits," she said.

She said the agency remains on board with the expansion.

"I think it's just going to be an issue of if we can
work together to find the resources to make it happen," she said.

Issues involved in expanding the shelter have included
redoing bathrooms and setting up partitions. The designated space is in a
second floor section that's been used as a classroom.

Gay Supervisor David Campos led the March 2010 hearing on
LGBT homeless issues. He, too, was caught off guard regarding the permit
problems.

"The reason we wanted to go this route is we wanted to
work with an existing shelter that was already permitted," he said in an
interview last week.

Campos said if they had known about the site's situation,
"We would not have gone this route." However, he said that
"given that we've done so much and we know now everything that needs to be
done," the decision was to stick with Dolores Street.

"I don't know how that was missed, to be honest with
you," Campos, who learned of the permit problem several months ago, said, "I
couldn't believe that when we were told that."

Campos expressed support for Phillips. He said she's "a
very capable woman who is doing a great job."

Planning Department spokeswoman Joanna Linsangan said she
hadn't received enough information about the situation at 1050 South Van Ness
to comment for this story.

Department of Building Inspection spokesman William Strawn
said that everything around his agency "is usually complaint-driven."
Staff tends to look specifically at whether there's an issue of non-compliance
with the building code or a public safety issue.

Strawn said that he'd just spoken with staff "familiar
with that part of the city," and "they weren't aware of there even
being a homeless shelter in that area."

However, records on the agency's website show the department
has had some history with the site in recent years. Data include information
filed in November 2011 related to remodeling the second floor bathrooms
"in conjunction with a homeless shelter." The work refers to the
space intended to be LGBT-welcoming.

In May 2010, someone complained "the shelter is not
wheelchair accessible," the records show. The case was eventually abated.

Waiting for space

As the permitting issues are sorted out, Dina Boyer, a 48-year-old
transgender woman, has stayed in three homeless shelters since June and it has
not been a welcoming experience. She said problems at the first two, Next Door
and the Sanctuary, included clients making comments such as "I don't want
to use the bathroom with men" and "What is he doing here?"

At Next Door, Boyer said, staff "would just look at me
like I was stupid" when she tried to talk to them. She completed complaint
forms at both shelters, but a Sanctuary staffer refused to take her complaint.

At Multi-Service Center South, staff at one point indicated
they wanted to house her with men, but she was eventually allowed to stay with
the women, Boyer said.

Kathy Treggiari, director of shelters for Episcopal
Community Services of San Francisco, which runs Next Door and Sanctuary, said, "We
try really, really hard to house people with dignity and respect, and to keep
them safe." All staffers from both shelters go through mandatory
transgender sensitivity training every year, she said. Staff members also have
to go through training that includes LGBT issues once a year.

"To my knowledge, staff had not overheard other clients
being inappropriate with [Boyer]," Treggiari said. "If they did
overhear it, they're mandated to write it up."

She did not know how widespread the problem is.

"I have 534 beds out of 1,134 beds in the city ... so I
don't have statistics on how often we hear" such complaints, but she said
the agency mostly hears from transgender women, as well as other women.

Boyer's complained to the city's Shelter Monitoring
Committee about MSC South but not directly to the shelter, she said. Calls to MSC
South and St. Vincent De Paul Society of San Francisco, which oversees the
shelter, weren't returned.

Boyer, who lost her job this year, had worked producing the
country's first public access TV show about the trans community until it was
defunded by the city.

Boyer said she's aware of the work to expand the Dolores
Street-run shelter.

"It's taking too long," she said.

Campos said he's "very frustrated" and "very
upset" with the issues around the site.

"I'm sorry that this has taken so long," he said. "I
am certainly trying to do everything I can to remedy that."

However, Campos added, "It's not just about opening up
the shelter, but making sure we make changes across the whole system so this
doesn't happen in any shelter." He said he's already called for more
training, and there would probably be another hearing later this year.